Smokey and the Bandit Run: Day Three: Mission Completed!

Whew! What a DAY this has been. I was never so glad to get away from a town as I was Meridian, MS. I'll bet if you look up all the 20/20, Dateline, and Murder in a Small Town episodes, you're bound to find at least 10 that spotlight that town. It was very sketchy and a little scary to say the least. I felt safe in the hotel room, but not so much outside it.

We left there heading west to Texarkana, TX. We went through Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and touched a toe in Texas.

The first stop today was in Vicksburg, MS. Yes, the Vicksburg from the Civil War. We explored this quaint little town an a whim.

When you look across the Yazoo river, you see Louisiana. The state line actually runs down the middle of the river.

We checked out two museums here. One was a Civil War museum that was privately owned by a very friendly and smart guy. This place was LOADED with artifacts from all over the south.

The other museum we checked out was a Coca-Cola museum. If you know me well, you know I am never too far away from a Diet Coke. How are Coke and Vicksburg connected? There was a candy store in Vicksburg that was bottling their own flavors of drinks. The gentleman who owned it decided to try bottling Coke. The first bottles were shipped to Atlanta and ended up being ok. So thanks to this little candy store in Vicksburg, we now enjoy colored sugar water in many flavors in bottles and cans. Who knew?

This is the operation used to fill those bottles. It's just so interesting to me how this candy store owner figured this out and created the industry norm.

From here, we moved on to Louisiana. We saw pipe lines for what we think may have been natural gas sitting in fields. We also saw oil well pumps in fields. I was glad Christian got to see those things actually do exist in the manner we have all seen in cartoons and movies.

It wouldn't be a Lindsey trip without checking out something very odd and unusual. So we stopped in Gibsland and checked out the Bonnie and Clyde Ambush Museum. It was kind of cool, but creepy at the same time. It felt strange to be there looking at embalming pictures of these two notorious robbers and murderers. The town is nothing more than a couple of buildings in the middle of nowhere, but they hang onto the famous take-down. They let everyone know that this is for educational purposes and not truly for celebration. We also drove down to the historical marker that marks the spot (about 30 feet away) where they were ambushed.

The marker was made with "bullet holes" in it.

Finally, we rolled into Texarkana! It's a lot like Bristol in that there is a historical section and then two blocks over there is nothing but run-down houses and apartments and destitute people. We stood in two places at once!